So this is just a quick post, essentially notes from setting up offsite backups using SFTP (formally FTP, but upgrading for security).
1.) Open a port in your rourter to all SSH connections to pass through (Wan > virtual server/port forwarding)
2.) Pick a non standard SSH port to limit your networks exposure to unwanted connection requests
3.) Connection to your local machine, in my case a Freenas machine and turn on SSH and allow tcp port forwarding (this option allows for the FTP connection to piggy back on your SSH connection, allowing the SFTP connection)
4.) If FTP connections are not turned on yet on your Freenas machine, turn those on
5.) Test your SSH connection using putty on your local network (use your ip, and port # then connect with your username/password)
6.) Test your SFTP connection using flash fxp or filezilla (again enter in your IP/hostname and proper port then user/pass)
If everything goes as follows locally, the next step is to test the connections from an external network. Again if all goes according to plan then the last step is to connect manually from the host machine you will be downloading files from.
**This last step is important. You need to do this in order to “save the keys” from the external machine. If you notice when you first made the SFTP connection through flash fxp it asked if you wanted to “save the key” for the server as it was new.